A Big Day for the deRosiers

When Steve and I got married in 2004, he was working as an embedded systems engineer for a company that made player pianos and I was teaching fifth grade. Between us, we made good money. We had no debt except the mortgage on my house. We had savings. The economy was in fine shape and our jobs were secure.

We knew we wanted to have a baby in the somewhat-near future and that we both wanted me to be able to stay at home to raise our child. For two years, we did our best to live on Steve's salary and put every penny I made into savings. It allowed us to learn what our lifestyle would be like on one salary, plus provided a huge cushion in case something bad happened. And then it did.

When Trevor was 3 months old, this happened:

We got a call at 4:45 am telling Steve not to come into work because the building was gone following a six alarm fire. He started working from home full time, which was wonderful (hence, the layout title of 'A Blessing in Disguise.') But the company was severely wounded from the fire and Steve was laid off just before Trevor's 2nd birthday.

I was absolutely devastated. Our only income, our source of health insurance for the three of us... gone. I was absolutely panicked over the thought that I might need to return to work if Steve couldn't find something new in a reasonable amount of time. Fortunately, it took less than 4 months before he had a new job. Overall, the job was better, but it meant that Steve now had a long commute. Trevor had a very hard time adjusting to Daddy being gone so much after nearly two years of having him home. I did too. But it was such a relief having him back to work.  

You can imagine how devastating it was, just 11 months later, when he was laid off from the new job. It took seven months to find the next job. By this point, the economy was in bad shape and layoffs were common.  In Steve's industry, the norm was now to hire for a specific project and lay off the entire team when the project was completed. Over the last few years, this has happened to him over and over. I can't even keep track of how many different layoffs we've been through - at least seven. Almost all of the layoffs blindsided us, coming at a point where we were just starting to feel secure, just before the one year mark.  

After the first two layoffs, the others weren't quite as devastating. We knew the routine with unemployment, COBRA, and everything else that goes into abruptly having no income. More importantly, we knew that the next job would be right around the corner. Steve is extremely talented and well-respected in his narrow (but high-demand) industry. He's received outstanding recommendations from the companies that laid him off. Each time, he's been snatched up by a new company quickly, thank goodness.  

So why is today a big day for the deRosiers? Because, after 6 years and even more jobs, Steve has now hit the one-year mark at his current job. Hallelujah!  

I feel so blessed to have such a talented husband whose hard work and perseverance has allowed me to be a stay-at-home mom all these years. I'm proud of us for planning ahead the way we did, for working together, and for being committed to doing what we think is best for us and for our child.